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Fieldwork: A Novel
 
 
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Fieldwork: A Novel (Paperback)

~ (Author) "WHEN HE WAS A YEAR out of Brown, my friend Josh O'Connor won a Thai beach vacation in a lottery in a bar..." (more)
Key Phrases: mission station, rice whiskey, big pink house, Dan Loi, Khun Vinai, Chiang Mai (more...)
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (51 customer reviews)

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  • This item: Fieldwork: A Novel by Mischa Berlinski

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A fictional version of the author serves as the narrator of Berlinski's uneven first novel, a thriller set in Thailand. Mischa Berlinski, a reporter who's moved to northern Thailand to be with his schoolteacher girlfriend, Rachel, hears from his friend Josh about the suicide of Martiya van der Leun, an American anthropologist, in a Thai jail, where she was serving 50 years for murder. As Mischa begins to investigate Martiya's life and supposed crimes, he becomes increasingly obsessed with the woman. The complications that arise have the potential to be riveting, but the chatty narrative voice takes too many irrelevant detours to build much suspense. Still, Berlinski, who has been a journalist in Thailand, vividly portrays the exotic setting and brings depth and nuance to his depictions of the Thais. Buried within the excess verbiage is a lean, interesting tale about, among many other things, the differences between modern and tribal cultures. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.


From Bookmarks Magazine

Mischa Berlinski originally intended to write an account of the real-life Lisu tribe of Thailand, but held scant interest in the project until he decided to fictionalize the natives and turned his research into a novel. In this readable and clever debut, told almost entirely in backstory, Berlinski explores the problems inherent in trying to assume the perspective of another person or culture and the enduring conflict between faith and science. While he treats each perspective with genuine empathy, he refuses to take sides. Critics had a couple of complaints—a lagging secondary plot and a few descriptions with a textbook feel—but dismissed them as minor. They unanimously praised Berlinski’s wit, style, and intelligence in this atmospheric "novel that never fails to fascinate" (Minneapolis Star Tribune).
Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 356 pages
  • Publisher: Picador (January 22, 2008)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312427468
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312427467
  • Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (51 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #11,751 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

More About the Author

Mischa Berlinski
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51 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.1 out of 5 stars (51 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
50 of 55 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Book, March 8, 2007
This review is from: Fieldwork: A Novel (Hardcover)
Well-researched and excellently paced novel. I was fascinated by the level of detail and found the non-judgmental tone of the author refreshing. The novel ended up being an anthropological study of 3 separate tribes--the fictional Dyalo (who appear to be based on the Lisu tribe the novelist studied extensively--look on [...]), American Protestant missionaries, and the curious tribe that lives in figurative ivory towers who spend their lives studying other tribes. The author seems to suggest that the universal tragedy that serves as the basis for the murder mystery aspect of the novel is the result not merely a simplistic clash between East and West, but one that can happen to any peoples who do not share the same world view or to anyone in any culture subject to common human emotions.

Terrific read, and highly recommended. I look forward to Mr. Berlinksi's future literary output--maybe something set in Italy, or perhaps involving Haitian voodoo cults?
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32 of 35 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Why I still read fiction, May 9, 2007
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This review is from: Fieldwork: A Novel (Hardcover)
Ten stars. Best book I have read in ages. The author's prose style is impeccable and transparent, and he tells an interesting story in a manner fair to all the overlapping and colliding worlds he describes (missionaries, anthropologists, hill tribes, Thais, and his own generation's Western wanderers in the East). This is worth a million grad school MFA seminar meanderings. Terrific reading; hope he writes another book soon and many, many more in the future.
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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Vivid reading, April 30, 2007
By Reader "cvrcak1" (Boca Raton, FL) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Fieldwork: A Novel (Hardcover)
I decided to read this book after reading Steven King's review of it in the Entertainment Weekly magazine. I found that the beautiful thing about this book is that everyone who read it has opinion about it. It does not matter if it us the title of the book, the characters in the book, or the attempt to figure out which genre the book can be slated for. It is wonderful that all readers find Mischa Berlinski to be talented and smart young writer with a lot of potential. I have truly enjoyed this book because it speaks on many levels at once: beauty of Asia, complexity of people and cultures they are part of, religious conflict(s), tragedy of human existance no matter how hard we all try to understand it and conform to it in order to fit in the society we are part of. I strongly recommend this book -- it is a wonderful read.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A Joy to Read
Fieldwork was such a happy surprise. Berlinski's writing is clear, attractive storytelling, his pacing is terrific, and I really enjoyed his portrayals of hipster expats,... Read more
Published 19 days ago by Historienne

4.0 out of 5 stars A lost soul in Thailand
The author invented an entire tribe of primitive people in Northern Thailand, and their elaborate belief system, to give his heroine a field for her anthropological researches... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Patto

5.0 out of 5 stars Fieldwork
Absolutely enticing, cannot stop reading. Intelligent, sensitive, provokes your identification at every step. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Marina T. Francisco

5.0 out of 5 stars missionaries and Dead Heads
Although this book loses steam near the end, it is still a fascinating read. Martiya van der Leun is an American cultural anthropologist in Thailand studying the Dyalo people... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Patti

1.0 out of 5 stars Long - Drawn Out - Don't Waste Time
I was so excitied when I got this book as a gift. However, when began the book was extremely dissapointed. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Kristi D. Fleming

5.0 out of 5 stars Thank you Stephen King
Ages ago, in a column in the Entertainment Weekly, Stephen King sang the praises of this book. He said to ignore the nondescript cover, the drab title, and snag this book - with... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Amy B. Brennan

2.0 out of 5 stars No Story, Just Background
If you like your fiction to be nothing but background information, with the story taking second fiddle to inane information about say a small tribe of nomadic mountain people... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Jon Gerloff

3.0 out of 5 stars Fieldwork by Mischa Berlinski
This novel started out great and really held my interest but then he got way too into the background of the missionaries and it became a snoozer for me. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Karen V. Reider

5.0 out of 5 stars Balanced, Vivid and Enlightening
This review is for the Farrar, Straus and Giroux hardcover first edition, 2007, 317 pages. FIELDWORK, a debut novel, does not appear on the USA Today's Top 150 Best-Selling book... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Gregory Bascom

4.0 out of 5 stars A Great Escape
Henry Miller said that a good book is only important to you if you read it at the right time in your life (which is why no one, in the history of ever, has actually liked reading... Read more
Published 11 months ago by Billy C. Plant

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